


Uninvited

by helsinkibaby



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Age Difference, F/M, Het, Rare Pair, Romance, Secret Relationship, Secrets Revealed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-21
Updated: 2016-10-21
Packaged: 2018-08-23 20:23:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8341456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helsinkibaby/pseuds/helsinkibaby
Summary: Caitlin doesn't think it's the best time to talk about her relationship with Joe. Barry doesn't care.





	

**Author's Note:**

> http://comment-fic.livejournal.com/761418.html?thread=100136266#t100136266  
> Theme : first lines  
> Prompt: The Flash, Caitlin Snow/Joe West, "I   
> really don’t think that now is the best time to talk about this.”

"I really don't think that now is the time to talk about this." 

Caitlin's jaw dropped as Barry seemingly didn't hear a word she said, just walked right by her into her apartment. "You and Joe." It was a demand rather than a question and Caitlin sucked in a deep breath as she closed the door behind her, followed him into her living room. Once there, she saw him pacing back and forth, thankfully not at super speed - she didn't think her security deposit would survive that. 

"Yes, Barry." She crossed her arms over her chest, squared her shoulders as she looked him right in the eye. "Me and Joe."

"You're not even going to try to deny it." 

"Would it make a difference?" Because after all, Barry had seen them outside Jitters, Joe's arms around her, her smiling up at him as he'd been leaning in for a goodbye kiss. Which, she was willing to admit hadn't been the smartest idea in the world, but they'd taken a chance and it looked like they were going to pay for it. Barry had disappeared in a rush of wind, probably due to shock, before they could talk about it and Joe had surmised that he'd come to him when he was ready. 

Instead, he'd come to her and it didn't seem to make a blind bit of difference whether she was ready or not. The typical Barry-ness of it all made her want to roll her eyes but she resisted. 

Barely. 

"How long?" It was another demand, this one with a little more anger behind it, a little more indignation. 

Caitlin took another deep breath, pushing her hair back from her face. "Six weeks, give or take," she told him, surprised by the way that his eyes widened, how his jaw dropped and his cheeks flushed. "I know it's a shock, but you weren't supposed to know, not until we knew what..."

Her voice trailed off as Barry shook his head. "That's not..." His finger pointed up and down in the vague direction of her chest which he was most assiduously not looking at. "Your shirt... the buttons..."

Caitlin looked down and bit her lip at what he saw, the buttons in a crooked line, one missed entirely, that button pushed into the next button hole, the resulting gap exposing a tiny sliver of her skin to his gaze. Turning away from him, she began righting herself, not at all surprised when a third voice entered the picture. 

"Yeah, Bar... that's what happens when you barge in uninvited." 

She heard Barry make a choking noise and when she turned, her eyes met Joe's. He was standing in the entryway to her bedroom - and of course, Barry knew where that door lead, thanks to a night that she'd really rather not remember. Joe was barefoot, his shirt untucked, buttons mostly undone and his trousers, so neatly pressed earlier in the day, were decidedly wrinkled. All in all, he looked like someone - and she knew she did too - who'd been interrupted doing exactly what they'd been interrupted doing. That knowledge was seared on Barry's face, suddenly much the same colour as his suit and he closed his eyes like he was trying to block out a set of images he really didn't want to imagine. 

"We didn't want you to find out this way." Joe's voice was calm, reasonable. It was a voice that always made Caitlin feel better and it did that now. Then again, that could have been the way that he reached out a hand towards her, the look in his eyes encouraging her to take it. Not that she needed much encouragement, circling the room to stand beside him, his hand in hers like an anchor as she looked at Barry. "We were going to tell you and Iris and Wally together... we just needed time to figure out what we were. Are." 

The last was said with a look down at Caitlin. "Are," she said with a smile. "Definitely are." 

His smile did more to calm her than the touch of his hand. It only left Barry more confused. "How did that happen?" 

Joe's lips twitched and she could almost hear his smart-ass answer. "Now, Barry, when a man and a woman like each other..." She narrowed her eyes at him, gave a very subtle shake of her head and he inclined his head towards her, conceding the point. "You never knew, Barry," he said instead. "When you were in the coma... I sat with you every night. Talking to you, waiting for you to wake up. And every night, Caitlin was there too." 

His fingers tightened on hers. "I was spending a lot of time at the lab because I didn't want to go home. Too many memories." It had been easier to be at STAR Labs, easier to find a distraction, something to keep her going, only returning home when she was so tired she'd go straight to sleep. "I'd check up on you, take your vitals, every couple of hours. And I'd tell Joe how you were doing, what tests we were running..."

"And then we started talking about other things too. You, when you were a kid. The lab, the accident... my day, stupid stuff that happened..." Joe rubbed a hand over his face. "One night when I was falling asleep on the chair, Caitlin brought me a cup of coffee... that started a habit." 

Caitlin smiled at the memory. "Every so often, he'd bring me a cup from Jitters... or a slice of cake, or a muffin..."

Joe was grinning too, a light in his eyes that had never been there during those late night chats, one that warmed her more thoroughly than the cups of coffee had ever done. "That was three years ago." Barry's voice cut through their reverie, still somewhere between shocked and angry. 

"Yes it was." Joe was still calm. "Because you woke up and I wasn't spending nights at STAR Labs anymore. You had these powers and we were dealing with that and everything else that happened, meta humans and the man in the yellow suit and a hundred other things that I never imagined we'd be facing..." His jaw tightened suddenly and Caitlin knew that look. It was the one she'd first seen when she'd woken from a light doze in his arms because of dreams of blue lightning and a terrible voice echoing from a black mask. She stepped a little closer to him, pressed her body against his and he blinked, almost like he'd forgotten she was there. 

"Then last year... when everyone found out about my situation..." As if he didn't know what she was talking about, she lifted a hand, let mists of cold air curl from it. "I was at the lab one night, working late, on my own... and a cup of coffee from Jitters appeared beside me." 

She felt her cheeks heat up and from the suddenly bashful smile on Joe's face, she guessed he might be feeling the same. "I told her if she ever wanted to talk to someone who didn't have a clue about the science but who just wanted to listen, that she knew where I was." 

"And I did." It still amazed her, even now, that those chats over coffee, a purely friendly overture, one that she'd even started off thinking as paternal, had led to this, something decidedly not. Because somewhere in those few months, she'd stopped seeing him as her friends' father and started seeing him, once again, as her friend. The slide to seeing him as something more, seeing him as a man, an attractive man, a good man, had been more gradual and she'd denied it to herself for a long time before finally giving in to her feelings. 

Finding out he felt the same had been an even bigger surprise, but a welcome one and for the last six weeks, she'd been happier than she'd ever been. She also knew the feeling was mutual. 

"We started spending time together." Joe shrugged. "And it just snowballed from there." 

"We did want to tell you, Barry," Caitlin told him quietly. "We just wanted to be sure first. You can understand that, can't you?" 

For a long moment, Barry was completely still. Then he nodded, even as he raised his hands to his face, joined as if in prayer, and dragged them down over his lips. "I get that, guys, I do... it's just..." Pressing his lips together, he looked at a spot over their heads. "It's a lot to take in." 

"We get that, Bar, we do. But this... us... it's not going anywhere. Just... let us tell Iris and Wally ourselves." 

"Tonight." Again, it was a demand and even though Caitlin could feel Joe bristle, she saw him nod. "When you get home?" Another nod. Barry's eyes lingered on their joined hands. "I'm going to go. Let you get back to..." He stopped talking, screwed up his eyes. "I'll see myself out." 

Caitlin didn't move and neither did Joe. They just watched him go and only when she heard the gentle snick of the door closing behind him did she move so that she was standing in front of Joe, both arms around his waist and her cheek against his chest. "Well," she murmured as one of his hands came up to cup the back of her head, "that could have been worse." 

"Yeah." She didn't lift her head but she could hear a smile in Joe's voice, could picture his lips turning up. "He could have actually walked in on us." 

Considering that the man could literally phase through walls, that could have been an actual consideration, and even though it shouldn't have, the idea of what Barry's reaction would have been to that make her giggle. It was possibly a hysterical reaction, she knew, but she was powerless against it. "Don't," she said but his shoulders shook under her cheek and it only made her laugh more. "I mean it." That was accompanied by a swat to his shoulder and he sucked in a deep breath, obviously trying to bring himself under control. 

"Are you ok?" he asked when he did. Taking her hand in his, he brought it to his lips, pressing a kiss to her palm. She shivered at the contact, almost missing his next question. "You're their friend... they're probably going to have more questions for you." He didn't sound too happy about that but she knew it was true, just like she knew the reason why. 

"Because no-one wants to discuss sex with their father." He shrugged his shoulders, lifted his eyebrows in resignation. "I'm ok," she told him and she was surprised to find out that it was the truth. "I want people to know, Joe... I'm tired of sneaking around." 

Joe chuckled as his fingers trailed a lazy path along her spine. "Ain't that the truth," he murmured. "Sneaking out of here at all hours... I'm too old for all this craziness."

It was Caitlin's turn to quirk an eyebrow. "Not too old, surely?" She let her voice trail off as her hands moved down his back, under the untucked shirt and down below the waistband of his pants. 

"Never." He grinned as his own hands began to trace a similar path. "But apparently, I need to get home..." 

"Don't worry." Caitlin began walking him back towards her bed. "I'm sure we can be quick." 

"But thorough." The last word was punctuated by a soft "oof" as she pushed him down on the bed and his hands found her hips, pushed up her skirt as she straddled him. 

"Always," she smiled, leaning down to kiss him, Barry and everyone else forgotten for the time being.


End file.
